


Three Days

by El Juno (ElJuno)



Category: Venture Brothers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-20
Updated: 2010-12-20
Packaged: 2017-10-13 19:43:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/141052
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElJuno/pseuds/El%20Juno
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Three days of uncertainty, drunkenness and super science following the first deaths of Hank and Dean Venture.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Three Days

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lintwhite](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lintwhite/gifts).



> This is intended to be set very early on in the show - reasonably soon after the first time Doctor Venture explained the clones to Brock (think of the scene in Perchance to Dean where he's showing off his clones) and, of course, after the boys' first deaths so any level of prickliness between Brock and the Doctor is due simultaneously to be a result of them not knowing each other all that much and, obviously, the boys' death. The boys are probably about 4 or 5.

-March 12, 10:15 pm

They dug the pit at the edge of the compound. A large pit, especially for its purpose, especially to hold the two small bundles wrapped in cloth that sat at its side.

Small bundles. Very small, almost more cloth than...well, more cloth than anything else in them.

On the other side from the bundles Doctor Venture stood, face carefully blank. It fell to Brock to take them down and place them almost surprisingly gently at the bottom of the pit.

The doctor let about 15 seconds pass, then turned away. Waved imperiously over his shoulder. "Fill it in, will you Brock? I'm going back inside, it's cold."

Then he was gone.

* * *

-March 12, 11:00 pm

Brock walked into the kitchen to see the Doc seemingly oblivious to everything around him, standing in the door of the refrigerator, searching for something. Brock cleared his throat and the doctor turned around suddenly, dropping a bottle of vodka as he did. Brock walked over, knelt down and snatched the bottle off the floor. Doctor Venture reached out for it.

"Give that back."

Brock looked at the bottle, then back at the Doctor and shrugged. Handed it back. Doctor Venture took a long draw off the bottle, then put it down and walked out of the room.

Ten minutes later, as Brock sat at the table, Doctor Venture walked in and grabbed his bottle back.

* * *

-March 13, circa 12:30 am

Fire.

Fire everywhere, the heat searing eyes and hands and the screaming, the screaming all around...

The screaming.

"Pop!" The screaming.

"Brock!" The screaming.

"Help! Please!" The screaming.

"It hurts! Please!" The screaming.

The scr...stop thinking about that. Stop as hard as possible. Do whatever necessary to stop thinking about that.

Stop.

* * *

-March 13, 1:21 am

Doctor Venture sat straight up in his bed, panting, covered in a slight sheen of sweat. A reassuring moment of "It was all just a dream" in his half-awake state gave way to a sudden realisation that it had been no such thing.

He ran a hand over his face wiping at the sweat. Then he stood and walked down to the kitchen. Opened the refrigerator and pulled out a bottle of schnapps and another of pineapple juice. Mixed them and tried to drink himself into a more peaceful mind.

It didn't work.

* * *

-March 12, circa 10:00 pm to March 13, circa 7:00

The constant thought in Doc Venture's mind that he would never admit to:

"But what if it doesn't work?"

* * *

-March 13, 5:00

Brock looked in to see the Doc standing back to him with his hand pressed to the glass of the tube that held a small figure of a slightly younger Dean. He watched as Doc slowly let his forehead hit the glass. Brock found himself unable to stop imagining what could be happening - eyes tightly closed, tears, both. For a second, he considered clearing his throat to catch the Doctor's attention. Only for a second.

As silently as possible, Brock turned away and walked back to the kitchen. He sat for about 15 minutes silently smoking before the Doc - obviously having shoved whatever emotion he'd been having back into the back of his psyche - came charging into the room clapping his hands. "Alright, alright, come on, let's get this over with. Golden Girls is on in an hour and a half and if you think I'm missing it for this you are grossly mistaken."

* * *

-March 13, 7:00 pm

The slightly-inebriated doctor turned to the machine's keyboard and started to punch keys hard, never looking up.

"I know what I'm doing, dammit." He said, then reached and pulled a lever. Several things happened then, at once. Several lights lit, a few more blinked on and off and there was the sound (though not the sight) of three small explosions.

Then a light went on in two of the standing tubes that held clones of the boys, one for Hank and one for Dean. The water started to drain down, leaving each body lying down on the bottom of their glass enclosure. Doctor Venture pulled open Dean's, placed his hand on Dean's throat and gasped out, "He's alive". As he proceeded to pull him out, he turned to Brock and nodded at the other tube, "Check him."

Brock pulled the other boy out into his arms and touched his chest. Nodded to the doctor, who seemed about to gasp out in joy, but, rather, grinned largely and said "I told you I knew what I was doing." Then he lifted Dean out "Help me carry them."

* * *

-March 13, 9:00 pm

Brock held the lead as they carried the limp forms of the boys towards their bedroom, careful not to drop them or hit them or otherwise wake them. Well, of course not. Who knew what that would lead to?

Going into the bedroom they tried, gently, to put the boys down into their pajamas. Can't have anything odd, can't let the boys wake to any change, any hint that something had happened. Dean went easy, sliding into his pajamas and slipping him into his bed and closing the top. Hank was more trouble, starting to mumble and twitch as Brock attempted to put his pyjamas on...eventually Brock put him down on the ground and they each took a leg and gently pulling the pyjama legs up, then slipping his arms in. Doctor Venture picked Hank up, then, and put him on his bed, tucking him in and closing the lid on the learning bed. He took a deep breath and turned to the door.

"Let's go" he said, and, after a few moments, he turned off the light.

* * *

-March 14 3:30 am

The boys were back (he hoped) But still.

He didn't remember what the dream was, all he knew is that when it woke him in the middle of the night he walked down to the kitchen, started up the coffee maker, since the sleeplessness of caffeine was far preferable to the nightmares waiting around in his skull.

* * *

-March 14, 9:00 am

The next day, Brock found him there, surrounded by empty mugs and crumbs and sitting with his head balanced on one hand while he considered his coffee cup.

Brock stood off to the side of the table, lighting a cigarette with clam hands.

It was tense. Very tense. There was something very important that was going to happen...had to happen.

And then they heard steps, two steps and three degrees of "clumsy" past being the pitter-patter of little feet, but at that moment it was the most beautiful sound ever.

Doc Venture raised his cup to his lips.

Hank skidded into the room first, slipping and sliding on worn-down pajama feet, followed almost directly by Dean.

The Doc slightly lowered his cup, revealing a vaguely manic, slightly drunk grin. Brock felt one threatening the corners of his own mouth, though only him and the blender knew.

"Good morning, boys!" Doctor Venture's grin became even more manic, possibly crossing the line into real happiness. Brock turned around to fiddle with the controls on what he was reasonably sure was a blender, but may have been any number of things, starting with a juicer. But, most importantly, it was a distraction, covered with little knobs to play with so that the boys wouldn't see his face, or more to the point, his facial expression. It only made sense, he didn't know what it was himself. "Hey, how are you doing? Do you want ice cream? Or cake?"

Dean got a sneaky look on his face. "How about ice cream cake?"

"Brilliant!" Doctor Venture said. "You two get dressed and we'll go get a...a...."

"Fudgie the whale" Brock said.

Doc Venture looked at Brock for a second, then cleared his throat. "Yes, right Fudgie the Whale."

"Wow, Pop" Dean said. "Really?"

"Really and truly."

"You're the best, Pop." Hank said.

"I know, I know. Now, go get dressed, you little hooligans."

As the boys ran out of the room, Doctor Venture turned to Brock. "See? I told you I knew what I was doing."

All Brock said was "Yeah, I know," but he was smiling a little bit as he said it.

Then there was a moment, and then Doctor Venture asked "And how the hell do you know what a Fudgie the Whale is?"


End file.
